While "Die Welle" is obviously aimed at teenagers (I believe the book is a set text in Germany), it suffers greatly from appearing to have been written by teenagers.
As I watched the implausible changes in mood of a disparate bunch of middle-class kids towards a uniformed regiment, I remembered the bollockings my English teacher would give me about the fundamentals of narrative. Show the children's reactions by all means, but at least have the courtesy to show us how these reactions came to be. The movement had no obvious constitution or ideology, and there was not even the merest hint that anyone had explored their reasons for joining or sustaining the movement. If I had been reading the script, I would have been wondering where all the missing pages went.
Since the film-makers didn't bother explaining why "Die Welle" was fundamentally different from any other High School clique, the entire movie becomes a shiny, empty waste of time.
What really annoyed me most about "Die Welle" were the actions of Tim the loner at the end of the show. It was only a matter of time before he went tonto; the experiment had little to contribute to his violent actions.
I watched this on BBC Four, late on Sunday night; I was expecting at least a dark thriller or a well-crafted examination of la condition humaine, but instead was presented with a hundred minutes' worth of teenagers being teenagers.
If you haven't seen this movie, please don't bother; you can learn much more about the teenager's psyche by reading "Lord of the Flies" and "The Wasp Factory".
As I watched the implausible changes in mood of a disparate bunch of middle-class kids towards a uniformed regiment, I remembered the bollockings my English teacher would give me about the fundamentals of narrative. Show the children's reactions by all means, but at least have the courtesy to show us how these reactions came to be. The movement had no obvious constitution or ideology, and there was not even the merest hint that anyone had explored their reasons for joining or sustaining the movement. If I had been reading the script, I would have been wondering where all the missing pages went.
Since the film-makers didn't bother explaining why "Die Welle" was fundamentally different from any other High School clique, the entire movie becomes a shiny, empty waste of time.
What really annoyed me most about "Die Welle" were the actions of Tim the loner at the end of the show. It was only a matter of time before he went tonto; the experiment had little to contribute to his violent actions.
I watched this on BBC Four, late on Sunday night; I was expecting at least a dark thriller or a well-crafted examination of la condition humaine, but instead was presented with a hundred minutes' worth of teenagers being teenagers.
If you haven't seen this movie, please don't bother; you can learn much more about the teenager's psyche by reading "Lord of the Flies" and "The Wasp Factory".